(CBS News)?
NASA has agreed to let Space Exploration Technologies -- SpaceX -- make a long-awaited test fight to the International Space Station, pending final tests.
SpaceX will combine two test flights of its unmanned Dragon cargo ship into a single mission, aiming for launch on 7 February.
The primary goal of the demonstration flight is to test the capsule's autonomous navigation and control systems before beginning routine commercial flights to deliver critical supplies to the lab complex.
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"Pending all of the final safety reviews and testing, SpaceX will send its Dragon spacecraft to rendezvous with the International Space Station in less than two months," Lori Garver, NASA's deputy administrator, said on Friday. "So it's the opening of that new commercial cargo delivery era for ISS."
Boosted into low-Earth orbit by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, the Dragon capsule will rendezvous with the space station two days after launch and carry out a series of tests to verify its software and control systems are working properly before NASA flight controllers give clearance for final approach.
If all goes well, the Dragon spacecraft will pull up to within about 30 feet of the lab complex on 10 or 11 February and wait for the station's robot arm to lock on and pull it in for a docking at the Earth-facing port of the forward Harmony module. The arm will be operated by Expedition 30 commander Dan Burbank, who arrived at the lab last month, and Donald Pettit, who is scheduled for launch on 21 December aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket.
Assuming an on-time launch and berthing, the Dragon capsule will remain attached to the station for two weeks before the robot arm swings back into action pull the spacecraft away, setting the stage for an automated re-entry, splashdown and recovery.
"This is a critical capability because with the retiring of the space shuttle we have now lost the ability to carry very big loads of cargo to the station and to return cargo from the station," Burbank said in a NASA interview. "So what we've done is we phased into basically a new chapter here where NASA is going to solicit and contract with commercial providers to do exactly that."
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